


we lean like gardens (toward light)

by mapped



Series: chances are (we are the same) [1]
Category: Black Sails
Genre: 4x09, Blow Jobs, Episode Related, First Kiss, First Time, Fluff and Smut, M/M, Season/Series 04
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-30
Updated: 2017-07-30
Packaged: 2018-12-09 02:24:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11659671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mapped/pseuds/mapped
Summary: Silver takes his shirt off. Flint probably shouldn't have criticised Silver for watching his eyes, because, as it turns out, that's just the pot calling the kettle black.





	we lean like gardens (toward light)

**Author's Note:**

> I promised something sappier than my last fic. Here it is, my humble addition to the wonderful collection of 4x09 sparring flashback fics out there! Title from 'Noble Aim' by Sleeping At Last.

It started when Silver took his shirt off.

Well, if Flint was being honest with himself, it started long before that. His defences had worn away each time the tide came in, until he was more saltwater than stone. He wouldn’t be able to pin down when, precisely, it had started. Perhaps it had been the forgiveness of a forest that played gentle witness to his confession of sins that were not sins. Perhaps it had been the predictable siren-song of a knife, unpredictably muted by a confused voice in the night which had coaxed him sweeter than a siren and lured his fist to open and let go. Perhaps it had been the whim of a windless sea, a hunger that had dug its claws into his bones and pierced nearly as deep as the sunless place where his grief lived. Or perhaps it had been something earlier than that.

It didn’t matter when it truly started. All that mattered was this: when Silver took his shirt off, Flint crumbled like sand.

The light out here on the cliffs was merciless, carving into everything like a sculptor’s chisel, and Flint was already enchanted by Silver’s neck, shining with sweat, glossy like the varnished curve of a violin. When Silver sat down on the rock and took his shirt off, Flint’s mind emptied of everything but music. He hung upon the sight before him as upon the tremulous swell of a sonata. The shape of Silver’s body, the lines of muscle, the breathtaking slope of his waist—it was sonorous, somehow. It reached into Flint and struck a high, quivering note. He was one taut string, made to vibrate.

Silver kept sitting on the rock. He shook out his hair from the tie, and said, “Did you ever do this with Thomas?”

Flint blinked. “What?”

“Fence,” Silver prompted. “Did you two ever fence?”

“Once,” Flint said. “Just once.”

“That’s a pity.” 

“Why?”

Silver leant back, his hands on the rock behind him, and Flint was thinking about how hot that rock must be, wondering if it was hotter than Silver’s skin, wondering if he might—possibly—be allowed to find out. “I don’t know,” Silver said, softly. “I just think that anybody who loved you should have had the pleasure of experiencing this as often as I have.”

Flint’s stomach tossed like a sleepless man. “Experiencing what, exactly?”

One of Silver’s hands left the rock and gestured vaguely, waving hazily through the air in Flint’s general direction. There was a quirk to his lips that could almost be called a smile. “Seeing you move”—he paused, tilting his head, as if considering—“it’s like seeing the sails rippling in the Doldrums. I thought I’d never see those sails move again. I’d forgotten what they look like when they move. When I watch you fight, when I fight _with_ you, it’s like that. It’s like remembering what movement looks like. It’s like seeing the wind for the first time.”

Flint shut his eyes. He couldn’t listen to this without _hoping_ , without wanting. His heart galloped on, a horse that had thrown off its rider.

“And that’s not even getting into what it feels like every time your sword’s at my neck,” Silver said. “But you’ve never cut me, not once. The amount of control that must take…” He inhaled sharply, audibly. “It makes me dizzy thinking about it.”

“It’s not as hard as you think it is,” Flint said, opening his eyes, sensing an opportunity to dissolve some of this tension that he felt. “You’re just too terrible a swordfighter to realise that.” He wet his lips and cracked a grin.

Silver’s eyes crinkled in answer. “And what I’m saying is, you’re too _good_ a swordfighter.” He picked up his crutch just to tap the side of the rock with it, to express his indignation. “So. It’s a pity that Thomas only got to experience this once.”

“It is a pity,” Flint agreed, and he did mourn the fact that he had only done this once with Thomas, but it was a memory that glittered as much as his sword-blade in the sun; he mourned more that he had never got to teach Miranda this, had never learnt what she might look like with a sword in her hand. Not that it would have come in any use to protect her against her death—it sliced him deep to think of it even now, how quickly he had been robbed of her presence that had been bread and water to him without him even knowing it, how there was absolutely nothing he could have done in that moment to save her.

Still, it would have been something to have fenced with her, even if it would have helped nothing. He pictured her besting him in a fight and smiling, gleaming and triumphant, and it seared him to know that it never happened, and would never happen now.

He sat down on the sand in front of the rock and drank from a waterskin. “On the other hand”—he could see Silver’s eyes tracking the droplets that trickled down his chin—“you’ve had the alleged _pleasure_ of experiencing this enough times that I imagine you must be tired of it by now. I know how exhausting training is.”

“Tired of this?” Silver’s lips curved in a revelatory smile. If anything was like the wind finally picking up in the Doldrums, it was the way Silver smiled these days, rare and slow, stirring something in Flint’s ribcage that had been motionless for too long. Silver leaned forward, and Flint leaned closer in response, to hear him say: “ _Never_.”

Filnt shivered. It was that wind in the Doldrums that had carried them here, to this island, to this cliff; he would let himself be blown by it, wherever it wanted to take him next. Right now, he felt its lazy push at his back. “You spend more time sitting down than you do standing up,” he teased. “I’d say you’re fairly tired.”

“Try getting your leg chopped off and having to use this damn crutch”—Silver kicked at the crutch lightly with the foot he did have—“and _then_ we’ll see who’s tired.” 

Flint winced. “I didn’t mean—”

“I know that,” Silver said warmly, and now his foot knocked drowsily against Flint’s calf. “Anyway, I may be tired of hopping around flailing my sword about, but I’m certainly not tired of watching your eyes.”

The toe of Silver’s boot kept prodding into him. He grasped hold of Silver’s offending leg, just above the boot cuff, and Silver raised his eyebrows. “I don’t think your technique is quite so awful that I’d call it _flailing_ ,” Flint remarked, rumpling the trouser fabric in his fist, too aware of the heat of Silver’s skin underneath. “Maybe at the beginning”—Silver squawked—“but you’ve undoubtedly improved since then.”

“I see,” Silver said, his fingers drumming on the rock. “And you’re just going to ignore my comment about your eyes.”

“All right,” Flint said, giving up on trying to navigate his ship around this particular inevitability. “Tell me about my eyes.”

“When I was a boy,” Silver said, “life was… grey. I’d seen trees. Grass. But you know London. It was the kind of place where even green things always seemed like they were dying.” There was a part of Flint that wanted to protest, because the London he knew wasn’t like that; he knew London as a jewel, vibrant and rich. But another part of him knew it was true, that London had been grey before he met the Hamiltons, that it was grey now and forever, devoid of anything that encouraged light and colour. He held his tongue, and Silver continued: “It wasn’t till I saw the Caribbean for the first time that I knew what green really was. Your eyes remind me of that feeling. Of discovering what the world could be, when it’s not withering. When it’s growing. I can’t look away from that.”

Flint’s hand had crept upwards and was now clutching Silver’s knee. He felt a tight gnawing in his belly. “It’s a learned skill,” he said, quietly. “A matter of discipline. You wouldn’t know it if I found your eyes distracting too, because I’m practised at making myself focus.”

“How’s your focus now?” Silver asked, and Flint let his eyes drift over Silver’s sun-gold skin, his powerful arms, the wide expanse of his chest tapering into that narrow waist. He couldn’t concentrate on any one thing; he was greedy for all of it, for every detail, down to the swirl of skin around Silver’s navel. 

“Poor,” Flint admitted, voice thick. Silver’s hands cupped his face, sudden and hot and insistent, drawing him forward; he went with its pull, shifting onto his knees, his hands on Silver’s thighs. He was close enough to nuzzle Silver’s chest if he wanted to, and _God_ , he wanted to.

“I’ve never been a huge believer in discipline myself,” Silver said, and Flint could see the way Silver’s skin thrummed with his pulse. “Life is short, and everyone else is going to try and stand in the way of you getting the things you want. So why stand in your own way?” It was the sort of thing Flint might have heard coming from Silver’s mouth months ago, cocky and bright, and it woke a dormant instinct in Flint, the instinct that would watch Silver getting punched and think, _I should be the one doing that_. But it was an instinct that could never be acted upon no matter how much Silver irritated him. Come to think of it, Flint was quite possibly the only person on the _Walrus_ who had never punched Silver. It was a strange miracle.

“If you keep talking,” Flint murmured, his lips hovering an inch from Silver’s skin, “neither of us are going to get what we want.”

“And what’s that?”

He nudged his nose into Silver’s chest and breathed deeply before pressing his lips to skin, and once he did, there was no going back. The taste of Silver’s skin lit him like a fuse, and he thought, a little hysterically, _It had to be done_. His world went white with the heavy cannon-shot rumble of desire that reverberated in his marrow; his hand came up to grip Silver’s waist, his other hand falling onto the rock, the roughness of it under his palm grounding him, and he learnt that they were just as hot as each other, Silver and the stone.

“Christ, _Captain_ ,” Silver said, as Flint kissed a wet path down the centre of his torso. Flint raised his head, looking up at Silver, and Silver’s hand was caressing his ear. He traced his fingers over Silver’s wrist by his neck, and then he rose on his knees, and Silver met him halfway. Silver’s mouth was sun-ripe and warm like the rest of him, his moustache soft against Flint’s own. Flint sucked Silver’s bottom lip between his teeth, and they kissed as if there was fruit bursting in their mouths and they were drinking every last drop of its succulent juice from each other’s tongues.

Flint rubbed his hand over Silver’s crotch, and Silver groaned into their kiss. The feeling of Silver’s cock under that cloth was almost perfect—he needed those trousers out of the way, and he needed, _fuck_ , he needed—

He broke the kiss, panting. “I don’t know what you want,” he whispered, squeezing Silver’s cock, his other hand winding into Silver’s hair, like ravels of silk around his fingers, “but I know I want these trousers off you _now_.”

“Well, Captain, I think I want your mouth on my cock.” The casual, brusque manner of Silver’s response inexplicably started a small fire in Flint’s belly. Silver was unbuckling his belt already, but then he stopped, biting his lip in a way that made Flint want to kiss him again. “Um. Wait. Am I allowed to say that? Is that a thing I’m allowed to say now?”

Flint laughed, smoothing a hand over the firm plane of Silver’s abdomen. “God help me. Are you _allowed_? Yes, I should think so. In fact, you can say it again.”

“I want your mouth on my cock,” Silver said, voice low and simmering this time, “Captain.”

It was a wildfire now, any meagre amount of reserve that Flint had left going up in smoke. “Well then, seeing as I want your cock in my mouth too, can we please proceed with getting rid of these trousers?”

Silver grinned. “Of course, Captain.”

Flint reached behind himself and quickly pulled his shirt up and over his head; a minute later, Silver’s trousers were finally, thankfully, gone, and Flint’s shirt had been draped over the rock, with Silver’s bare arse perched on top of it. And Flint was looking at Silver’s cock, because he could, because it was beautiful.

Thomas had these sketches from his Grand Tour that he showed Flint once, ancient ruins scattered on grassy hills; Flint hadn’t thought of them in years, but when he looked at Silver’s cock, those red chalk drawings resurfaced in his mind. A proud column of an imposing temple, shaded like a sunset sky.

He touched it reverently, stroking it, down, and up, and caressing the head of it with his thumb. Silver sighed. “Captain, please.”

Flint rubbed it against his cheek, feeling shameless, _free_ , to be doing this in the open air, so near the sea he could smell the tang of its waves, and yet with solid ground under his knees. Silver cursed. “Goddammit, fuck, _Captain_ , you look so— You look like you’re—praying. Or something.” Silver seemed to laugh, but it was just a shaky huff of air.

Flint smiled at the idea. The idea that Silver _was_ his temple, his refuge, his sanctuary, a place of worship that had shielded him from a world that had cried for his blood time after time. Nowhere better to be on his knees than here, between the walls of Silver’s thighs. He dragged his cheek against Silver’s cock again, smiling into it, the scent of it heady as the endless Caribbean summer.

Then he was licking a slow stripe up Silver’s cock, swiping his tongue over the head, lapping at it over and over as Silver gasped. He took it into his mouth, just the head, and sucked it gently, gently, and it was intoxicating, the taste of it; he couldn’t help but slide his mouth further down. It felt so good, a weight that belonged there on his tongue, a stretch that his lips were always meant to fit around.

He was so absorbed in it, in the gradual, surprising process of remembering how to move his tongue and his mouth and his hand together in a coordinated fashion, how to breathe and how to keep his teeth behind his lips, when the thickness of Silver’s cock was so overwhelming that it obliterated thought, the rigid length of it unyielding and undeniable, an exquisite challenge. The sounds that Silver was making were such satisfying rewards, each breathy whine pretty as a paper-wrapped parcel. It startled him when he felt Silver’s hand on his cheek, Silver’s thumb seeking out the corner of his mouth, and dipping to where spit was running down Flint’s chin, smearing it across his skin.

Flint’s jaw was aching where Silver’s hand cradled it, and it was such a wonderful ache, sweetened by Silver’s touch. He moaned; Silver’s thumb brushing back and forth along the underside of his chin was so unbelievably pleasurable, and his hips jerked uncontrollably, once, twice, against nothing, only the frustratingly elusive friction of his own trousers. 

“Look at me,” Silver said, and Flint opened his eyes, his gaze wobbling in the vicinity of Silver’s chest, caught on those brown nipples, as he let Silver’s cock fall from his mouth for a moment, granting himself leave to flick his tongue down over Silver’s balls, relishing the different texture of them, the soft sacs of skin that gave so generously into the press of his tongue. “No, look at my eyes, Captain. _Flint_.”

Flint let his gaze climb further up, over the pendant of Silver’s necklace, over Silver’s slack mouth, till it reached Silver’s eyes, their transcendent blue. “Oh _God_ , yes. That’s right. Look at my eyes. Tell me how hard it is not to be distracted by them when we fight.” 

Silver’s smile was wicked, and Flint wanted to kiss the mischief from it. “It’s very hard,” he growled. “Everything about you is so fucking distracting.” He sucked one of Silver’s balls into his mouth, and Silver cried out above him. He hollowed his cheeks as he worked it and feathered his tongue against it, and he watched those eyes, watched them flutter briefly shut, watched them open, twin skylights through which Flint could understand the sky above him in stunning clarity. 

He would never again be trapped in darkness; he had an unfailing source of light. As long as the sacred fire of Vesta kept burning, the city of Rome would not fall. The light of Silver’s eyes was not something that could be easily extinguished by a stray gust of wind. Flint only had to keep Silver alive and by his side.

He wrapped his lips around Silver’s cock once more, took it as deep as he could, letting it fill his mouth completely. He shuddered, keeping his eyes fixed on Silver’s, and felt himself to be nothing but the tender hinge of his jaw, the strain of his lips skimming up and down around the fullness of Silver’s cock, the meeting of his eyes and Silver’s that formed a current in the air, and he was swimming against it, against that current, breathless and powerless, utterly at its mercy. And it was _good_. Mindlessly, staggeringly good.

“Captain, you look _incredible_ ,” Silver said, his voice ragged and hushed. His thumb was stroking the edge of Flint’s mouth again, his fingers pressing into Flint’s cheek, feeling for the shape of his own cock through Flint’s skin. “God, you’re fucking amazing, sucking my cock and looking at me while you do it.”

Flint groaned around Silver’s cock, a noise which Silver echoed and amplified, his eyes desperate now, and intense, the sky before rain. Flint fastened his lips around the head of Silver’s cock and sucked relentlessly as he pumped the shaft of it with his fist; he had recovered it all, every trick he had once known, and Silver whimpered and came, his hand squeezing the nape of Flint’s neck tight. He was panting, but then his jagged breaths lifted into shaking laughter as Flint swallowed and kept on sucking Silver down. That laughter like the splash of waves on a shore made Flint giddy with a toes-in-wet-sand kind of happiness, watching the creases around those rockpool-at-high-tide eyes.

“Stop, stop!” Silver was still laughing, his hips squirming under Flint’s hands, and Flint reluctantly let Silver’s softening cock slip from his mouth. He nosed the sensitive skin beneath Silver’s navel to hear more laughter bubble from Silver’s throat, pure white sea-froth sounds that Flint revelled in; he sprinkled idle kisses wherever he pleased, on Silver’s hipbone, on the inside of Silver’s thigh, nipping the skin playfully so that Silver yelped.

He turned to one side so that he could unfold his legs and splay them out underneath one of Silver’s, and he rested the back of his head upon Silver’s thigh. He could comfortably gaze up at Silver this way, and he was content to do this and nothing else.

But then Silver was swinging his foot into Flint’s leg again. Flint batted it away, grunting a noise of disapproval.

“Don’t we need to take care of you?” Silver asked, his broad, warm palm gliding slowly over Flint’s chest, the heel of it brushing against Flint’s nipple.

“In a minute,” Flint mumbled. Silver’s thigh made for such an agreeable pillow, and his desire was so much less urgent now that he had sated himself on the taste of Silver’s seed. He simply wanted to enjoy this moment.

Silver hummed, drawing aimless patterns on Flint’s chest, as Flint watched the breeze playing in Silver’s curls.

“Madi knows,” Silver said, eventually, thought Flint couldn’t tell if it had been a minute of silence or five, since time was dripping like honey. “That I… That I…” He faltered, his fingertip ceasing its frivolous motions.

Flint ran his hand up Silver’s flank, savouring the softness of skin, the hardness of muscle and bone. “I know.” 

“You know that she knows, or that I…”

“Both,” said Flint, placidly. “You wouldn’t do anything without her knowledge.” He smiled up at Silver. “And I love you too.”

Flint had never seen Silver blush, and Silver wasn’t blushing now, but there was a kind of embarrassed curl to his lip, a particular way that he was scrunching his face, that was almost the equivalent of a blush.

“It’s been _minutes_ ,” Silver complained. He brushed his hand over the top of Flint’s scalp, and Flint shivered with pleasure. “I want to touch you.”

“You _are_ touching me,” Flint pointed out, and Silver jabbed Flint’s knee with his boot. Flint grabbed it again to hold it still, and Silver pouted sullenly, adorably, at him. “Shhh. Good things come to those who wait.”

A wider smile spread over Silver’s face. “Are you promising me good things, Captain?” And the wind filled out the unfurling sails in Flint’s chest, whistling through the rigging of his ribs. He was suddenly as impatient as Silver; he couldn’t wait to see where it would take him—take _them_ —next.

He had to look away from Silver’s delighted face for a moment lest he start blushing himself, and so he nestled his cheek against Silver’s cosy thigh, and _oh_ , that was nice.

On second thought, maybe he _could_ wait.

At least just another minute.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are really appreciated! <3 Come find me on [tumblr](http://reluming.tumblr.com) for constant yelling about my favourite pirates.


End file.
